Guren “Bobby” Zhou, a UK businessman previously investigated for money laundering, purchased $100 million worth of tokens from the Trump family’s World Liberty Financial crypto project.
The New York Times reports on Zhou’s background and the massive transaction through his firm Aqua 1.
Two years earlier, Zhou was a failed hardwood flooring retailer in Britain who had come under investigation there for money laundering and presided over the collapse of a small crypto start-up.
Then seemingly out of nowhere, he became one of the biggest buyers of tokens from Trump’s company, World Liberty Financial, dropping a total of $100 million through a new firm called Aqua 1.
Said Zhou during an audio stream on X,
“We’re very proud to be a major player in the World Liberty, which is Trump’s family’s crypto venture.”
Under World Liberty policy, as much as $75 million of that money was distributed to a company controlled by the president and his three sons.
World Liberty maintains a compliance program that meets or exceeds industry standards, a spokesman said.
It is not clear how closely World Liberty scrutinized Zhou’s past, but the money laundering investigation in England was publicly available information.
Even now the source of the money that Zhou paid to World Liberty remains a mystery.
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